Survival Skills

This country was built by people who had good survival skills. The skills were transmitted by parents to children at a time when there was no school.
Nowadays the basic skills we need are not so different, though they apply to the city jungle: we still need to learn how to handle a budget, especially if we are poor, and how to find a job, especially if we do not have a job.
A number of jobless people around here, in Savannah GA, have very good working skills, mainly in housing jobs (electricians, plumbers, carpenters who have suffered from the economic downturn), and I am surprised to see how many of them have no survival skills: they do not know how to manage a smaller budget, what is the best time to show up for a job, how to dress for a job interview, when to ask for a letter of recommendation, or even how to manage food stamps.
How come?